Past, Present, Future
by kwarbler
Summary: It's the one year anniversary of a tragic event. There once were three. Now there are two. (one-shot)


**Past, Present, Future**

A Lizzie McGuire One-shot. It's the anniversary of a tragic event. There once were three and now there are two.

I don't own Lizzie McGuire or any of the characters.

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Today marks the one-year anniversary of her death. That one-year, in her absence, seems to have lasted a lifetime. Whether this was caused solely by her passing, the passing of my best friend, or if it was just mere coincidence, I've no idea. I feel like I've aged a million years since then. So much has happened since that day---since I got that call.

It's funny how when something so life changing happens, you can remember all the details. It had been half past ten and I was on my way to work. I had stopped to pick up my usual coffee and donut on the way to the office when my cell rang. I remember I had set my coffee on the roof of the car as I reached for my purse to grab the ringing phone. I saw his number and grumbled something about his annoying habit for bad timing.

I answered and all he'd said was there had been a terrible accident and my stomach lurched. He didn't have to say who or what. Somehow I knew. His tinny voice coming through the phone confirmed what my heart had already told me.

I'd always warned her. She had been a terrible driver. Nervous, distracted, flighty---she had all the textbook symptoms you saw in those bad driver films they show at the DMV. I never let her drive when we were in the car together. This time she has been running late to the gallery and decided to save time by fixing her make-up in the car. She had some sort of new big shot artist coming in that she just had to meet.

When she ran off the road into the embankment, she'd been applying her mascara with the little plastic wand. They found the tube approximately twenty feet away, where it had been thrown from the car when, well...you know. It was black.

I think it's safe to say I'm not the same person I was then. Neither is he. As detailed as the events of that day are ingrained in our minds, it was everything after that that blurred together. All I know for sure is that we grasped on to each other for strength and survival. We were the only two who understood—who somehow understood what exactly it was that we had lost. It was a new feeling for us. It ultimately drove us closer to each other, perhaps closer than we had ever been, but farther away from everyone else. They couldn't know our anguish. Maybe we subconsciously didn't want them to. It was a private feeling only we were allowed to have.

The year has had many ups and downs. We are healing, albeit slowly. As cliché as it sounds, the pain does lessen as the months go by. It will never fade completely but it does become livable. It becomes a dull aching part of you. At least I no longer wake up, forgetting that she's gone, only to have to relive the experience of her death as the memories once again reinvade my consciousness.

I have found new things to live for, a few in particular. I have attempted to create a new reality for myself, but in a town of constant reminders of her it isn't easy. Every street corner has her story; every inch of this town has her face stamped upon it.

Today takes me back to a place I'm not sure I want to be. I've been dreading this day for weeks. There is no reminder of the one-year anniversary on my calendar where I keep all of my important appointments. I don't need a reminder, as I haven't yet found a way to forget.

There is only one place I want to be today. There is one place I need to be. The same place he is.

I get in my car, willing myself to start the engine. As I drive, I pay attention to the road. No radio, no distractions. The same fate won't befall me it did her. It can't—or at least not today. The fates wouldn't be that cruel to him.

The car is on autopilot, driving to a destination it has learned so well in recent months. I park and slowly make my way among the smooth granite gravestones and carefully manicured lawns. I can see the top of his mop of brown curls, sitting patiently in front of the simple stone that her family had picked. So elegant, so simple, so her.

As I approach from behind, I give him a one armed hug and a ruffle of the hair to let him know I'm there. He looks at me with a sad smile, the deadness in his eyes that had been steadily fading away is back. They are red and tired. They are cold and dark. At first they scare me but then I remember. I remember why we are here and why we are doing what we are doing.

I sit next to him but we don't speak or touch. We just sit and stare and think for a long time. We sit for hours lost in our thoughts and memories, hoping that she's listening. There isn't much need to say anything aloud because we've said it all before over the course of the past year. It seems more respectful to honor the silence of the graveyard, the memory of our friend.

I never needed words to communicate with her before and I don't intend to start needing them now. She understands me as I did her. She understands this or so I hope.

As I finish what I've come her for, I start to rise. It's been long enough. I catch his eye and he pleads with me for just a little more time. I grant it to him, whispering my goodbyes to her as I run my fingers over the cut out letters carved into the stone, cold to the touch. I take one last look. I memorize it.

_**ELIZABETH BROOKE MCGUIRE  
1987-2012  
BELOVED DAUGHTER, FRIEND, HUMANITARIAN  
FOREVER IN OUR HEARTS AND SOULS** _

I walk back to my car and wait, hoping he'll be along soon. Hoping he won't be too drained and unreachable. Hoping her hold on him, on us, might finally be broken. After about ten minutes he appears. He envelops me in a warm hug and holds me tightly.

As I pull away a bit, I'm happy to see a little of the light has returned to his cloudy blue-gray eyes. He's still solemn and rightly so, but he looks like he'll survive. Like we'll survive. Whatever he said to her must have been cathartic. I pull him back to me and rest my head on his shoulder as we both say our silent prayers and shed our last tears.

He wipes the few tears out of my eyes and then studies me. He looks like he's searching for something.

"What?" I ask confused.

"Miranda, do you think we're doing the right thing?" he asks, his voice unsteady.

I solemnly nod. "Yes", I say pausing before I continue. I take a deep breath. "I really do. We both need to let her go. We need to move forward", I whisper forcefully not wanting to upset him, but trying to make my point.

He nods back at me in turn.

We had agreed. We wouldn't be coming back here soon. As much as we loved her and still do, we needed a clean break. Just for a while. So we were moving. We were leaving Hillridge behind. She would understand. I think that's true anyway. She would want us to be happy. She would want for us to live happy productive lives.

The thing is that in truth, Lizzie had been as huge a part of our lives in death as she had been during her life. The memory of her and the person she was was always upon us. It was something we had a hard time escaping but desperately needed to. It's not that we wanted to forget Lizzie, but she had always been our center of attention, the center of our world, and in a way she still very much was. It was still all about her.

We had decided that after the anniversary came and went, we would get out of town. We would focus on our lives and ourselves. We would attempt to focus on us with no dark shadows of our past looming over our heads threatening to come between us. We needed to figure out how the friendship that had started as three, the friendship that always had Lizzie as its base, would survive as only two. We owed it to ourselves.

I lace my fingers with his as we stand against each other. As horrible as this whole ordeal has been, it has produced something positive. I kiss the side of Gordo's face and lovingly stroke his hair as he tries to smile for me. Somehow in all this mess, we managed to find each other as more than the best friends we had always been. We had found in each other the missing pieces that had always been absent in past relationships. They might have always been there waiting for us to figure it out, but we'd never had the courage to look before. With Lizzie around we'd never been able to.

He opens my car door for me and I get in. Before he shuts it he runs his fingers down my arm before they settle on my stomach. He feels the slight bulge of my protruding belly and I can see his warm eyes start to glow and a smile creep over his pain staked features. He realizes what he is feeling. He realizes that a part of him is growing inside of me.

We kiss chastely as he closes the door. Now is not the time and place. He gets in his own car and I watch in the rearview mirror as he follows me back to my apartment. The rented moving truck is parked out front waiting for us to fill it with our possessions. It's a sign of everything yet to come.

I look at my ring finger where a simple silver diamond sits. It is beautiful and I sigh. It isn't a happy sigh nor is it a sad one. It's just a sigh. I watch as my fiancée, as Gordo, starts to gather already packed boxes and load them in the van. I never knew actually leaving would be this tough. I sigh again. This is the way it needs to be.

_Lizzie, you will always be a part of us, but Gordo and I need to have this time alone, without you. I hope you understand, but we will find our way back someday--with our own children. Can you imagine Gordo and me having children? Would you have ever thought it possible? Yeah, me either. You two were the ones written in the stars._

_I have to go. We have to go. Gordo is calling me. I have to finish my packing. Goodbye Lizzie. We will always love you. Goodbye._


End file.
